Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

The limited number of steam tanks was always stupid. “Lost technology” was a 40k thing that felt very out of place in a universe where guns and steam/clockwork automata were becoming ever more common.

 His Master's Voice wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
They aren't everywhere, they are a small minority of options and they are the rare ones to boot.

Your list has fifteen entries, and five of them are bears.

As far as I'm concerned, that's a lot of bears, and that's before the mounts are accounted for.

A third of the army being fantastical is in line with other human rosters, so again this just makes Kislev more of the same. Empire was riding around on griffins and mechanical horses while Brettonia had pegasai, so Kislev is LESS fantastical in that regard.

I don't even disagree with the concept in theory--GW moving towards a more fantastical setting with TOW makes sense and is a legitimate creative choice just as much as the feelings of people who don't like that choice. But the evidence just isn't there. This isn't like 8th Empire verses previous books, or Storm of Magic, or Monstrous Arcanum.

Even the entire premise is that the Kislev roster is more fantastical than pre-8th edition. At the most extreme it is halting a trend towards increased craziness that existed in 8th.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
The limited number of steam tanks was always stupid. “Lost technology” was a 40k thing that felt very out of place in a universe where guns and steam/clockwork automata were becoming ever more common.

Well those folks in Marianburg did figure out how to make some very fancy land ships.

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
Thinking about it, a less cynical reason for revealing early may have been simple exuberance.

I imagine people in the studio liked the Olde Worlde even more than we did and were even more crushed to see it go. I'd further imagine they were told the word Olde Worlde would never cross their lips again.

So once the ban was lifted I imagine they were jumping to share the good news.

Thinking about it this is probably more likely than a fear of Oathmark or 9th Age.

Also, remember that a lot of these people live in the same town. They go to the same pub. They've been friends for years.

Warlord bloke : We're releasing a new version of KoW
GW bloke with an NDA : <Bites tongue> Oh really?

They'd have been desperate for an announcement

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:

Spoiler:

 Mentlegen324 wrote:

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
Yes but that's because it's a story and supposed to have cool things happen. The heroes journey and all that.

Bilbo and Frodo had never seen an elf before they started their journey.

Luke was on a farm hanging out with his buddies on the weekend and never been off world.

But if there's elves and dwarves and dragonkin and catfolk all drinking at the inn and the airship station is down the block then there's no hero's journey, you're already in a world of wonder.

If an WHFB army has A pegasus and A wizard that's one thing. When there's steam tanks and griffon knights and ice bears everywhere there's no baseline mundane life to move on from.

Bilbo and Frodo had never seen an elf because Hobbits purposefully kept out of the dealings of the rest of the world and preferred to stay in the Shire. Luke had never been off world because he was a relatively poor moisture farmer and had reason to leave nor anywhere to go - he had to stay to help Owen and Beru. They were both backwater places with characters who didn't venture anywhere, the experience of WHFB peasant is still going to be that sort of low-level fantasy where it's mundane most of the time - things like the clockwork horse, Kislev Ice Bear etc are not going to be common things that no one is bothered about having seen.

The old lore still had these sorts of things. There's been Griffon and pegasus riders alongside giant oversized nonsensical canons the size of a ship since Man O War, Steam tanks have been part of the Empire for a long, long time as well as various other Imperial Engineer school creations. Dwarfs had all their various contraptions. Cathay had terracotta automatons, stone dog mounts, crow men, lightning unicorns and monkey men. Kislev had the Ice Magic weapons, Ice Palace, Ice Witches everywhere, a bear god who took the form of a bear with the land of Kislev being a bear and them making uses of Bears as mounts and such. I really don't get how things are meant to be different now.

I mean, the Empire had like 8 Steam tanks in total, and the technology to make them was long forgotten, so they could never make more...

And the bear artillery reads the same way, but again people are applying a double standard.

And you know this how?

The Lore of the Kislev bear cannons is that 12 were made, most were lost. https://www.totalwar.com/blog/total-war-warhammer-3-kislev-roster-reveal/

So it's 12 special cannons pulled by an animal that can be tamed/trained that's a big part of Kislev society (which is not a new addition) imbued with mage from the Ice Witches who are also a big part of Kislev Society (also not new lore). I don't see any sort of drastic change there.

 Mentlegen324 wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:

Spoiler:

 Mentlegen324 wrote:

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
Yes but that's because it's a story and supposed to have cool things happen. The heroes journey and all that.

Bilbo and Frodo had never seen an elf before they started their journey.

Luke was on a farm hanging out with his buddies on the weekend and never been off world.

But if there's elves and dwarves and dragonkin and catfolk all drinking at the inn and the airship station is down the block then there's no hero's journey, you're already in a world of wonder.

If an WHFB army has A pegasus and A wizard that's one thing. When there's steam tanks and griffon knights and ice bears everywhere there's no baseline mundane life to move on from.

Bilbo and Frodo had never seen an elf because Hobbits purposefully kept out of the dealings of the rest of the world and preferred to stay in the Shire. Luke had never been off world because he was a relatively poor moisture farmer and had reason to leave nor anywhere to go - he had to stay to help Owen and Beru. They were both backwater places with characters who didn't venture anywhere, the experience of WHFB peasant is still going to be that sort of low-level fantasy where it's mundane most of the time - things like the clockwork horse, Kislev Ice Bear etc are not going to be common things that no one is bothered about having seen.

The old lore still had these sorts of things. There's been Griffon and pegasus riders alongside giant oversized nonsensical canons the size of a ship since Man O War, Steam tanks have been part of the Empire for a long, long time as well as various other Imperial Engineer school creations. Dwarfs had all their various contraptions. Cathay had terracotta automatons, stone dog mounts, crow men, lightning unicorns and monkey men. Kislev had the Ice Magic weapons, Ice Palace, Ice Witches everywhere, a bear god who took the form of a bear with the land of Kislev being a bear and them making uses of Bears as mounts and such. I really don't get how things are meant to be different now.

I mean, the Empire had like 8 Steam tanks in total, and the technology to make them was long forgotten, so they could never make more...

And the bear artillery reads the same way, but again people are applying a double standard.

And you know this how?

The Lore of the Kislev bear cannons is that 12 were made, most were lost. https://www.totalwar.com/blog/total-war-warhammer-3-kislev-roster-reveal/

So it's 12 special cannons pulled by an animal that can be tamed/trained that's a big part of Kislev society (which is not a new addition) imbued with mage from the Ice Witches who are also a big part of Kislev Society (also not new lore). I don't see any sort of drastic change there.

We will also see, if they are on ice or sleds, because the GW concept art is more traditionalist:



From here: https://www.warhammer-community.com/2021/05/13/a-giant-bear-beats-up-daemons-in-total-war-warhammer-iiis-new-gameplay-trailer/?fbclid=IwAR1qvNCedqiaZtDm4YtRNidIUD6akbcBInGxDR4xZZ9VZrCzdD-seKuSou0

Background wise, in my head, I'm very much a goblins-stabbing-peasants-in-the-mud guy for the Old World. I collected an Orc army that was very much based on rank and file. Minimal magic items.

But I did tend to bring along a Level 25 Savage Orc Shamen because it used up a LOT of points.

And I added Goblin Suicide Hangliders at the first opportunity.

Hmm.

This may not be as rank and file on the table as it is in my head.

Let's see what spells that Shamen had access to. I'm sure it won't be that flashy.

"Open Demonic Portal. At the end of each of the casters turns, 6D6 lesser demons and 1 greater demon are unleashed. They will always charge the nearest non demonic troops of either side as soon as they get the opportunity"

Oooooh-kay. Maybe that's a bit of an anomaly.

"Summon Skeleton Horde"

Right. Yeah.

"Vorpal Hurricane of Chaos - D6 2" vortices which move randomly and destroy everything they touch"

Still.

Bears sound completely weird and random things to turn up on the table.

Well, maybe for a filthy orc player like yourself, but good and proper Human wizards from the Empire could bind a monstrous host with, can you believe it? 12. I'll repeat that - TWELVE! Bears!

Guess how many bears a Kislevite mercenary contingent could take? None. Tsk tsk.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
A third of the army being fantastical is in line with other human rosters, so again this just makes Kislev more of the same. Empire was riding around on griffins and mechanical horses while Brettonia had pegasai, so Kislev is LESS fantastical in that regard.

I'm not really trying to argue what WFB was or should be. I'm simply expressing my disappointment with the one tone nature of Kislev's flavouring.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
The limited number of steam tanks was always stupid. “Lost technology” was a 40k thing that felt very out of place in a universe where guns and steam/clockwork automata were becoming ever more common.

Lost tech makes a lot of sense though. It's an age where there is no repository of all knowledge and if an inventor dies and didn't have highly trained apprentices or written records (that were clearly put together); or they all die together (fire, war etc...); then even if there's a living example of their work, it can still be hard to recreate it. Small differences in things like the metal formula used for casting the steam boiler which lets it build up enough pressure to provide enough force to move the tank; whilst not being too heavy to bog it down - would be one example of how a small bit of missing information could stall the production of more. Or mean that newer ones perform worse than the originals. Which when they are already a huge financial investment, might make them unsuitable for general production for war when they've other weapons and means to invest in which work.

Dwarves did have the tech (and way more) but in Old World were fully in their "we are a dying race, we aren't letting those lesser races like humans and those upstart elves get a hold of our secrets". So they could well withhold the key info even during wars ect

 His Master's Voice wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
A third of the army being fantastical is in line with other human rosters, so again this just makes Kislev more of the same. Empire was riding around on griffins and mechanical horses while Brettonia had pegasai, so Kislev is LESS fantastical in that regard.

I'm not really trying to argue what WFB was or should be. I'm simply expressing my disappointment with the one tone nature of Kislev's flavouring.

What's the one tone?

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 His Master's Voice wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
A third of the army being fantastical is in line with other human rosters, so again this just makes Kislev more of the same. Empire was riding around on griffins and mechanical horses while Brettonia had pegasai, so Kislev is LESS fantastical in that regard.

I'm not really trying to argue what WFB was or should be. I'm simply expressing my disappointment with the one tone nature of Kislev's flavouring.

What's the one tone?

Bears. Ice. Ice Bears. Bear Ice.

That's very clearly two, and only encompasses a minority of units. So it cannot be the one tone you were referring to. With all due respect please let us know the actual "one tone" you are speaking of instead of beating around the bush.

 Overread wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
The limited number of steam tanks was always stupid. “Lost technology” was a 40k thing that felt very out of place in a universe where guns and steam/clockwork automata were becoming ever more common.

Lost tech makes a lot of sense though. It's an age where there is no repository of all knowledge and if an inventor dies and didn't have highly trained apprentices or written records (that were clearly put together); or they all die together (fire, war etc...); then even if there's a living example of their work, it can still be hard to recreate it. Small differences in things like the metal formula used for casting the steam boiler which lets it build up enough pressure to provide enough force to move the tank; whilst not being too heavy to bog it down - would be one example of how a small bit of missing information could stall the production of more. Or mean that newer ones perform worse than the originals. Which when they are already a huge financial investment, might make them unsuitable for general production for war when they've other weapons and means to invest in which work.

Dwarves did have the tech (and way more) but in Old World were fully in their "we are a dying race, we aren't letting those lesser races like humans and those upstart elves get a hold of our secrets". So they could well withhold the key info even during wars ect

I tend to think that some steam tanks got made, and then the mechanical brains of the project (a dwarf renegade) was bumped off by other dwarves for sharing secrets with a lesser race, and as yo say once they're gone, no more steam tanks

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 His Master's Voice wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
A third of the army being fantastical is in line with other human rosters, so again this just makes Kislev more of the same. Empire was riding around on griffins and mechanical horses while Brettonia had pegasai, so Kislev is LESS fantastical in that regard.

I'm not really trying to argue what WFB was or should be. I'm simply expressing my disappointment with the one tone nature of Kislev's flavouring.

What's the one tone?

Bears. Ice. Ice Bears. Bear Ice.

But why do you think that's vastly different from their previous depiction? I've not read the original stuff so the information I have is from the WHFB wiki, but they've had all that sort of thing to what seems like a large extent since at least second edition of the RPG all the way back in 2004. Ice Witches and the Frozen court, the Ice Queen in an Ice Palace, using magical Ice Weapons, the land of Kislev represented by a Bear (as Kislev was thought of a a "spirit" itself) with a religion involving worshiping bears with a God of bears who took the form of a bear, and bears being held in high regard in Kislev society with rules on how they should be used, to the point the bear religion was just part of Kislev culture overall, and the use of Bears as mounts. All that has been there for close to 2 decades now, the difference is now we have the spirit of the land of Kislev made manifest by a magic ice Bear, a Sled that's coated in a layer of magic ice, and bears being used to pull things rather than just mounts. There isn't really anything there that's not in-line with that previous lore.

Kislev has always been Bears and Ice. Just now we're actually seeing that represented.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
That's very clearly two, and only encompasses a minority of units. So it cannot be the one tone you were referring to. With all due respect please let us know the actual "one tone" you are speaking of instead of beating around the bush.

Most of the new stuff is ice, bears, or ice bears, though. I like the confluence of Slavic influence in the form of Polish lancers or Cossack infantry, but those are all holdovers from the WHFB days. The new stuff is pretty one-note.

 OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:
I tend to think that some steam tanks got made, and then the mechanical brains of the project (a dwarf renegade) was bumped off by other dwarves for sharing secrets with a lesser race, and as yo say once they're gone, no more steam tanks

WHFB canon was that all the Steam Tanks were made by a single 'mad scientist' inventor, and once he died the Empire struggled to keep the remainder working, let alone build new ones.

 catbarf wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
That's very clearly two, and only encompasses a minority of units. So it cannot be the one tone you were referring to. With all due respect please let us know the actual "one tone" you are speaking of instead of beating around the bush.

Most of the new stuff is ice, bears, or ice bears, though. I like the confluence of Slavic influence in the form of Polish lancers or Cossack infantry, but those are all holdovers from the WHFB days. The new stuff is pretty one-note.

 OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:
I tend to think that some steam tanks got made, and then the mechanical brains of the project (a dwarf renegade) was bumped off by other dwarves for sharing secrets with a lesser race, and as yo say once they're gone, no more steam tanks

WHFB canon was that all the Steam Tanks were made by a single 'mad scientist' inventor, and once he died the Empire struggled to keep the remainder working, let alone build new ones.

Which is fine - except that they can also make mechanical animals and other more advanced tech.

Now there is also some recent lore in WFRP4 that Leonardo did receive some assistance from the Dwarfs or obtained some info and they are keen that this is not repeated.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
What's the one tone?

Bears, obviously.

The ice doesn't bother me as much. The theme could have been implemented better, but it would be easy to remove it from any potential future models.

 OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:

 Overread wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
The limited number of steam tanks was always stupid. “Lost technology” was a 40k thing that felt very out of place in a universe where guns and steam/clockwork automata were becoming ever more common.

Lost tech makes a lot of sense though. It's an age where there is no repository of all knowledge and if an inventor dies and didn't have highly trained apprentices or written records (that were clearly put together); or they all die together (fire, war etc...); then even if there's a living example of their work, it can still be hard to recreate it. Small differences in things like the metal formula used for casting the steam boiler which lets it build up enough pressure to provide enough force to move the tank; whilst not being too heavy to bog it down - would be one example of how a small bit of missing information could stall the production of more. Or mean that newer ones perform worse than the originals. Which when they are already a huge financial investment, might make them unsuitable for general production for war when they've other weapons and means to invest in which work.

Dwarves did have the tech (and way more) but in Old World were fully in their "we are a dying race, we aren't letting those lesser races like humans and those upstart elves get a hold of our secrets". So they could well withhold the key info even during wars ect

I tend to think that some steam tanks got made, and then the mechanical brains of the project (a dwarf renegade) was bumped off by other dwarves for sharing secrets with a lesser race, and as yo say once they're gone, no more steam tanks

I don't actually know the lore behind it. I do know that in one of the Gotrek and Felix stories Nuln gets attacked and the Steam Tank factory (well the university its being made in) ends up with a huge freaking hole in it and several steam tanks totally destroyed as a result.

Maybe the giant ice bear won't actually get a model and it's just for the video game.

Or it's permission only?

Or reserved for massive, high points battles?

Surely there won't be a giant icebear in every 2000pt list right?

One can dream.

The comical looking ice sleds could just be a video game effect too...Still not keen on the concept ice or not.

Will need to see what they do to Empire and Bretonnia before making a final judgement but the more they reveal the less I care.

 catbarf wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
That's very clearly two, and only encompasses a minority of units. So it cannot be the one tone you were referring to. With all due respect please let us know the actual "one tone" you are speaking of instead of beating around the bush.

Most of the new stuff is ice, bears, or ice bears, though. I like the confluence of Slavic influence in the form of Polish lancers or Cossack infantry, but those are all holdovers from the WHFB days. The new stuff is pretty one note.

So not only were you BSing us with the 'one note' you are shifting the goal posts to cover it and STILL missing the mark since there are new units which are neither ice nor bear themed. That is some serious bad-faith discussion right there.

Kislevs uses bears for playing football. Khorne has no one but two units of cavalry riding daemonic cyborg-rhinos.

They are bears. Fething bears. You can see Putin riding one in our world. Not pegasi, hypogryph, demigryph, white lions, dragons, hydras, wholly mammoths, wholly rhinos, ice-age based mountain monsters, undead or spectral nightmares, skeletal snakes or giant zombie vultures. They are just bears. Like orks with boars or goblin with wolves.

I think most people problem with complaints about this is not that we are negating people feelings towards a change in style or directive but just the fact that change doest not exist, and even worse when it is used as a excuse to say "old better new bad".

The only change between this roster and bretonnia 6th roster is the giant ice bear because back then they didn't had that technology.

And I have complained about space wolves flanderisation. But with kislev I really believe they have keep some restraining.

Kislev has always been russians, polish, ices and bears. You have all of that, and the most elite cavalry unit of the faction are NOT the bear riders BUT the normal winged lanced gryphon legion. And then you even have other snow animals in the form of snow panther.

Thats more variety than High Elves with their white lion-pelt wearing axemen with white lion chariots and dragon knights with archmages in dragons and lords in dragons and lords in eagles and eagle chariots.

I don't disagree with you entirely but I stopped playing WHFB long before AoS. Rules, balance, lore, pricing, model count, model design. Everything was going in a different direction.

I still wince when I see the Empire Mecha-Horse or the Dark Elf Chariot with one wheel. Like the Kangaroos or triple bow strings from Lumineth, I have to ask why? just why?

High Elves went from a beautifully designed army and turned into a zoo exhibit, so I'm not going to defend anything post-6th edition.

Sometimes i wonder how can anyone look at the old, early edition Warhammer Fantasy models and say they're "beautifully designed" with a straight face. They're all so blatantly held back by the technology and sculpting and budget of their time i find it hard to take them remotely seriously.

Goose LeChance wrote:
I don't disagree with you entirely but I stopped playing WHFB long before AoS. Rules, balance, lore, pricing, model count, model design. Everything was going in a different direction.

I still wince when I see the Empire Mecha-Horse or the Dark Elf Chariot with one wheel. Like the Kangaroos or triple bow strings from Lumineth, I have to ask why? just why?

High Elves went from a beautifully designed army and turned into a zoo exhibit, so I'm not going to defend anything post-6th edition.

Yeah 6th just made everything too gritty. Give me things like giant castles on top of sea serpents that the Dark Elves used to kill others with.

I think it depends what point you mean "old and early". Also don't forget people might look back fondly at the designs and have hoped that the more modern sculpts would have retained the same design ethos and approach.

Of course sometimes its muddy because, as noted several times in this thread, the old armies had things that were missing which were 100% there in the lore and art, but which just were impossible/impractical at the time with the budgets, sculpting skill and materials that GW had to work with at the time.

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:
Sometimes i wonder how can anyone look at the old, early edition Warhammer Fantasy models and say they're "beautifully designed" with a straight face. They're all so blatantly held back by the technology and sculpting and budget of their time i find it hard to take them remotely seriously.

CAD is to model design what CGI is to movies.

In the right hands, a powerful tool.

In the wrong hands... well... Transformers and Teclis.

Goose LeChance wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:
Sometimes i wonder how can anyone look at the old, early edition Warhammer Fantasy models and say they're "beautifully designed" with a straight face. They're all so blatantly held back by the technology and sculpting and budget of their time i find it hard to take them remotely seriously.

CAD is to model design what CGI is to movies.

In the right hands, a powerful tool.

In the wrong hands... well... Transformers and Teclis.

I'd say the current Teclis and early Warhammer models that were all as wide as they were tall, the only pose they could do is a T-pose with gigantic, extremly thick weapons held out straight by their sides, and all looked like various kinds of shaved primates are equally bad, just in the exact opposite way.

How about elves riding giant jurassic park lizards, or putting them into chariots? How's that not too high fantasy/flanderizing? They have horses, and yet two out of 3 mounted units in Dark Elf army, even in 6th ed, were mounted on lizards. And lizards are much dumber and harder to train than bears.

TBH I love cold ones.

I really can understand why for most people is different for Kislev. Because Kislev are humans. Technically, they are "good humans" so different from chaos humans.

In Warhammer everyone had magical stuff and fantasic stuff because they were fantasy races. Humans were in the "peak warhammer period" so 5th-6th basically three historical factions, france, holy roman empire, and poland-lituanian mixed with russia. You had Pegasi and Gryphons and Wizards but that was it.

But that was, and is, a minimal portion of the whole warhammer fantasy universe and only in a comparatively short spawn of time of two editions and 2-4 factions. Compared with basically all the other factions of warhammer fantasy during all the rest of the game existence.

I mean WHFB Araby was literally a historical army ported over from when GW did historical miniatures but in warmaster it was expanded with giant Djinns and flying carpet archers, etc, etc...

A lot of good points in the past several posts.